DC: We had a situation where you could return people to France... that's the most sensible thing… that's not available at the moment@AnushkaAsthana: Because of Brexit?
DC: Because of the situation we're in.@David_Cameron on if he'd have gone for Rwanda policy as PM#Peston pic.twitter.com/82AlI2aM0R
— Peston (@itvpeston) April 24, 2024
Lord Cameron has been blasted by Reform UK leader Richard Tice for suggesting Brexit is the cause of Britain’s migrant crisis.
Speaking to ITV last night, Lord Cameron was asked whether he would have pursued the Government’s Rwanda policy if the crisis had emerged when he was Prime Minister.
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He replied: “We had a totally different situation because we had a situation where you could return people directly to France”.
“I’d love that situation to be the case again, that’s the most sensible thing; people land on a beach in Kent, you take them straight back to France, you break the model of the people smugglers.”
Asked why the Government is not pursuing that strategy today, he argued “that’s not available at the moment, that’s simply not possible at the moment”.
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Richard Tice has blasted David Cameron's historical innacuracy (Image: Getty)
Asked if that’s because of Brexit, he vaguely replied: “Because of the situation we’re in, because of the attitude of others, so it’s not available at the moment.”
The Foreign Secretary's implicit blame of Brexit has seen him blasted by Reform UK leader Richard Tice, who told The Express that Lord Cameron is “talking nonsense”.
He said: “Under the Dublin convention, more illegals were being sent here than back to France.
“It does not work for France, which cannot send people back to Italy, for example, proving it makes no difference. He is talking nonsense.
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"Before Brexit, he was PM, and didn't send illegal migrants back. He just paid France more and talked a lot.”
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Brexiteers argue that the Dublin Convention did not help Britain (Image: Getty)
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According to Home Office figures and a House of Commons Library briefing, between 2015 and 2018, 2,365 people were actually transferred to Britain under the Dublin convention.
Meanwhile while the UK requested 18,953 request to transfer migrants to EU countries under the convention, just 1,395 removals were approved.
So while the UK accepted 33% of requests to take in migrants under the Dublin Convention, fellow EU members accepted just 7% of outgoing requests.
By contrast, Germany removed 17% of migrants, France removed 8% and Greece removed 108%.
The number of migrants flooding into Britain over the channel has also rapidly changed from Mr Cameron’s time in office.
In 2018 just 299 came across in small boats, but by 2022 that had increased by 15,202% to 45,755
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The figures suggest Lord Cameron is wearing rose-tinted glasses about the success of the pre-Brexit systems in place.
Lord Cameron’s comments may re-ignite concerns on the right of the Tory Party that his return to Government was a poor decision by Rishi Sunak.
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In November last year, former Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng said Mr Cameron symbolises “the politics of yesterday”.
Lord Frost said the appointment took Britain “back to the past: a world in which Brexit may have happened legally but not in the mindset of those who rule us.”
Tory peer and Boris Johnson backer Peter Cruddas fumed: “The coup is complete, Remain has won and democracy has lost”.
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